WORK THE CROWD STAKES AT GGF WILL FEATURE SAUCEY EVENING
Saucey Evening will try to secure her fourth career stakes victory Saturday at Golden Gate Fields when she competes in the $50,000 Work The Crowd Stakes.
The Work The Crowd, a 1 1/16-mile contest for fillies and mares bred in California, highlights this week’s racing at Golden Gate Fields. Southern California jockey Jose Valdivia, Jr. will skip a day of action at Santa Anita in order to ride Saucey Evening in the Work The Crowd for trainer Graham Motion.
Saucey Evening has earned $368,459 in just 14 career races while amassing four wins, two seconds and two thirds. A 4-year-old daughter of More Than Ready, Saucey Evening has made all but two of her starts in stakes events.
Saucey Evening won two stakes as a 2-year-old when she rallied from last to first in both the 1 1/16-mile California Cup Juvenile Fillies and the seven-furlong California Breeders’ Champion Stakes at Santa Anita. Saucey Evening went 1-for-6 during her 3-year-old season, the victory coming in the one-mile Starine Stakes on the turf at Hollywood Park on Dec. 3.
The Work The Crowd Stakes will be the third race this year for Saucey Evening, who finished sixth in the 1 1/8-mile Sunshine Millions Filly and Mare Turf on Jan. 30, and most recently, second in a 1 1/16-mile allowance race at Santa Anita on March 4.
Saucey Evening, owned by Augustin Stable, will have five rivals in the Work The Crowd, including three-time stakes winner You Lift Me Up. Trained by Jerry Hollendorfer, You Lift Me Up is a 5-year-old mare who has seven wins in 30 career starts and $401,299 in earnings. Russell Baze will ride You Lift Me Up.
The field for the Work The Crowd Stakes, in post position order, is as follows: Rule The Storm, Michael Martinez rides; Croxie, William Antongeorgi, III; Saucey Evening, Valdivia; You Lift Me Up, Baze; Barbara’s Love, Julien Couton; and Shes a Lucky Wager, Frank Alvarado. All of the starters will carry 122 pounds.
MAWING BENCHED -- Leslie Mawing, the fourth-leading jockey at the meeting with 43 victories, is serving three-day and five-day riding suspensions back-to-back and won’t be back in action again until March 28. Mawing received the suspensions from the stewards for causing interference in the stretch aboard Mistical Dream (who was disqualified from fifth and placed sixth in the third race on March 6) and Michael The Man (disqualified from second and placed fourth in the first race last Friday).